People think pronunciation is not part of standard English but it is, in spite of regional variations.
My trainer in English for Second Language Users said when westerners hear Africans speak they refer to their pronunciation as stilted meaning it does not conform to the general rules of pronounciation called intonation ( colloquially called accents.) This is in spite of the fact they know that Midland and Liverpudlian accents are different from the London 'accent' and they know until Tony Blair came to power ( his deputy John Prescott is a northerner)southerners mocked the northern English 'accent' just as it happens between northern and southern Nigerian English ' accents'.
I have stated in this forum before how my undergraduate linguistics teacher Professor Oke said he could tell when attending conferences in London where Africans came from by the way they spoke English.. That meant regional accents conditioned by their first language.Since Africans don't speak the same first language this conditioning is bound to be different. I can now tell an East African from a South African or an Ethiopian apart from a West African ( and a Ghanaian from a Nigerian as well as Yoruba from Igbo or Hausa) merely by the way they articulate English. To an English listener they all have an undifferentiated African stilt (accent.)
When I speak in the UK and the US people tell me I do not have a thick African accent as such and such. This means I have been able to drop as much of my African language accent determined intonation as I could. What I do not generally divulge is that I FORMALLY trained to do so using specialist publications to build on my undergraduate phonetics classes. This is how I know it can be taught. Because it was never part of the curriculum of teaching English in Nigeria people are resistant to its introduction. They refer to it pejoratively as speaking through the nose.
After spending more than 15 years in the UK I had a Checkoslovakian student who was less than 5 years in the country and intonation- wise spoke better English than I do so I asked her how this hapoened? She confirmed to me what I already suspected: from early schooling in her country they were taught English including correct pronunciation by specialists according to how westerners actually pronounced. When Pa Oyewole (our undergraduate phonetics and phonological expert) tried to make us do the same thing it was too late. My classmates rebelled and the man referred to the anti- intellectual climate all over the place when it came to phonetics and phonology.
Now when it comes to politics I have canvassed since the late 90s that federal public office holders should be made to go through the same standardised re-learning of English as a pre- requisite to entering politics at the federal level. Once that is done the Buhari debacle would not repeat itself. Not only that if that is applied to the other 3 lingua francas federal politics will be sanitised because.
1. It will ensure only those who respect the other broad cultures in the country practice politics at the federal level. The cultural acrimonies will be lessened.
2. Learning itself disciplines the mind so we will have more disciplined federal politicians.
Nigerians are currently demonstrating the cultural inferiority complex that no Nigerian language can be made to stand shoulder to shoulder with English as lingua franca. A country like India passed that stage a long time ago.
As at now the only pre- requisites are general minimum education, age and money with the last being the most decisive. Any money bags or any one with money bags backer can get inti politics to go in search of more money without any higher disciplined goals.
OAA
Sent from my Samsung Galaxy smartphone.
-------- Original message --------
From: "Farooq A. Kperogi" <farooqkperogi@gmail.com>
Date: 26/03/2020 04:19 (GMT+00:00)
To: USAAfrica Dialogue <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Haba!
This is not an issue to be touchy and self-conscious about. When Obasanjo was in power, northerners, especially Hausaphone northerners, also mocked southern Nigerian English accent. I've published letters in my now rested grammar column from readers who derided southern Nigerian accents. Here is an example published on January 20, 2007, which is archived on my blog:
"And one thing [about] the people of southern Nigeria is that their spoken English is not very good. However, they keep thinking that they are the best. [They are] very ignorant until they happen to be in the white man's land when they know [the truth]. A southerner here will pronounce 'mother' as 'murder' and 'occur' (correctly pronounced as something like 'occa') as 'occo,' 'doctor' (pronounced 'docta') as 'docto, and so on.
"On many occasions, you will see President Obasanjo addressing the English-speaking white people who most times resort to using translators fixed to their ears [rather] than listen to him directly. I really don't understand. What is the factor governing the difference in [pronunciation] between the North and South of Nigeria when it comes to English Language?"
In my response to the writer, I dispelled his assumptions and I pointed out that an accent is the unique, phonologically specific, culturally determined, and sometimes unconscious, way we orally express ourselves.
Pronunciation is only part of the story of an accent. You can have a perfect English pronunciation (in any case, there is no such thing as a "perfect" English pronunciation, which explains why pronunciation is not an ingredient of Standard English) and have the "wrong" accent, depending on where you are and who is listening to you.
As far as most non-Nigerians are concerned, interestingly, all Nigerians—whether they are southerners or northerners—have fairly the same national accent with only insignificant, barely perceptible variations. In fact, it's customary for Americans and Europeans to talk about not just a "Nigerian accent" but also an "African accent." Inattentive? Yes! But that's the reality.
Most non-Americans, for instance, also think there is a monolithic American accent, which is, in fact, indistinguishable from Canadian accent. But anyone who lives in America and pays attention knows there are wide regional variations in accents, and that the southern drawl tends to invite the most ridicule nationally.
There is no such thing as a person who has "no accent." As phonologists often remind us, "a person without an accent would be like a place without a climate."
Accents have been used historically to distinguish between in-group members and outsiders. For instance, the term "shibboleth," now understood in everyday speech to mean "a manner of speaking that is distinctive of a particular group of people," was used in ancient Israel to tell one tribe of Jews from the Ephraimites, who reputedly couldn't pronounce the word "shibboleth" because they didn't have the "sh" sound in their own Hebrew dialect.
School of Communication & Media
"And one thing [about] the people of southern Nigeria is that their spoken English is not very good. However, they keep thinking that they are the best. [They are] very ignorant until they happen to be in the white man's land when they know [the truth]. A southerner here will pronounce 'mother' as 'murder' and 'occur' (correctly pronounced as something like 'occa') as 'occo,' 'doctor' (pronounced 'docta') as 'docto, and so on.
"On many occasions, you will see President Obasanjo addressing the English-speaking white people who most times resort to using translators fixed to their ears [rather] than listen to him directly. I really don't understand. What is the factor governing the difference in [pronunciation] between the North and South of Nigeria when it comes to English Language?"
In my response to the writer, I dispelled his assumptions and I pointed out that an accent is the unique, phonologically specific, culturally determined, and sometimes unconscious, way we orally express ourselves.
Pronunciation is only part of the story of an accent. You can have a perfect English pronunciation (in any case, there is no such thing as a "perfect" English pronunciation, which explains why pronunciation is not an ingredient of Standard English) and have the "wrong" accent, depending on where you are and who is listening to you.
As far as most non-Nigerians are concerned, interestingly, all Nigerians—whether they are southerners or northerners—have fairly the same national accent with only insignificant, barely perceptible variations. In fact, it's customary for Americans and Europeans to talk about not just a "Nigerian accent" but also an "African accent." Inattentive? Yes! But that's the reality.
Most non-Americans, for instance, also think there is a monolithic American accent, which is, in fact, indistinguishable from Canadian accent. But anyone who lives in America and pays attention knows there are wide regional variations in accents, and that the southern drawl tends to invite the most ridicule nationally.
There is no such thing as a person who has "no accent." As phonologists often remind us, "a person without an accent would be like a place without a climate."
Accents have been used historically to distinguish between in-group members and outsiders. For instance, the term "shibboleth," now understood in everyday speech to mean "a manner of speaking that is distinctive of a particular group of people," was used in ancient Israel to tell one tribe of Jews from the Ephraimites, who reputedly couldn't pronounce the word "shibboleth" because they didn't have the "sh" sound in their own Hebrew dialect.
Farooq
Farooq A. Kperogi, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
Journalism & Emerging MediaSchool of Communication & Media
Social Science Building
Room 5092 MD 2207
402 Bartow Avenue
Kennesaw State University
Kennesaw State University
Kennesaw, Georgia, USA 30144
Cell: (+1) 404-573-9697
Personal website: www.farooqkperogi.com
Cell: (+1) 404-573-9697
Personal website: www.farooqkperogi.com
Twitter: @farooqkperogi
Author of Glocal English: The Changing Face and Forms of Nigerian English in a Global World
"The nice thing about pessimism is that you are constantly being either proven right or pleasantly surprised." G. F. Will
"The nice thing about pessimism is that you are constantly being either proven right or pleasantly surprised." G. F. Will
On Wed, Mar 25, 2020 at 6:50 AM Toyin Falola <toyinfalola@austin.utexas.edu> wrote:
--Many private messages have been sent that Southerners are mocking Northerners over language and accents. And some have been posted with one going viral.
Haba! When Kperogi was talking about verbs and nouns, you all forget that he is not an Igbo man. I don't know that verbs and nouns now have colors.
Haba! When someone says a letter emanating from a state house, a paid media communicator with a degree, is badly written, what as being Kanuri or Hausa go to do with this?
Haba! Have you not heard Gowon speak? Or he speaks well because he is not a Hausaman? Do you not know of a man called "the golden voice of Africa?" Tafawa Balewa, Nigeria's first prime minister!
Haba! Let me show you the recorded Keynote Address by Malami Buba, my Fulani friend; or the writings of Aisha Bawa, my Fulani friend; or of Bunza, my Fulani friend; or Ashafa, my Kaduna friend; or Bishop Kukah, the Zangon-Kataf man. Are they not better than many of the so-called southerners?
Haba! Everything is not about resource control or federal character.
Haba! This nonsense must stop today.
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